


Yours, Mine, and Ours

by PockySquirrel



Category: Power Rangers Samurai
Genre: Curtain Fic, F/F, Lauren doesn't know how to feelings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-15
Updated: 2015-09-15
Packaged: 2018-04-20 21:07:37
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,484
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4802237
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PockySquirrel/pseuds/PockySquirrel
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Slowly but surely, Lauren and Serena are invading each other's lives.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Yours, Mine, and Ours

**Author's Note:**

  * For [PunkPinkPower](https://archiveofourown.org/users/PunkPinkPower/gifts).



> Thanks to Second Batgirl for the beta. <3

It's no surprise to Lauren when Serena excuses herself from the festivities, apologizes, and says she's going to bed early. Her health has improved greatly, but her stamina isn't yet back to what it was before her illness, and she still tires easily sometimes. 

It is a surprise to Lauren when, a few more hours of socializing with the other Rangers later, she retires to her room only to find Serena sleeping soundly in her bed.

She stands frozen for a moment, watching the steady rise and fall of Serena's chest and wondering what she's supposed to do. Serena is a guest. The Shiba House has several extra rooms. Shouldn't she be sleeping in one of them? Why Lauren's bed? She's perplexed and annoyed, but ultimately her desire to not disturb Serena's much-needed sleep wins out, and she goes to sleep in the guest room down the hall.

She asks Serena about it over breakfast in the morning, and Serena looks disappointed. 

"I only got in your bed because I thought you'd join me," she explains. 

Lauren's face turns red. She's never dated anyone before Serena, and her samurai training certainly never prepared her to navigate such a relationship. She feels clumsy and stupid, like a tourist in a strange country who doesn't know the language and whose ignorance of the customs is glaringly apparent. She apologizes for not realizing, but Serena just shakes her head and smiles.

"It's my fault. I should have been clearer. I'll try to do better from now on." 

They share Lauren's bed that night, tangled up together in the narrow space. It’s crowded and awkward, and Serena keeps stealing the blankets. 

It's perfect. 

***

Lauren's room at the Shiba House is spotless, plain and undecorated. Were it not for the half-filled closet of neatly organized clothes and the single photograph on the dresser, it would have been impossible to tell that anyone lived there. For all Serena can tell, Lauren doesn't even think of this place as her home. She certainly hasn't put forth any effort to make it look like one. 

Maybe Lauren had left her personal effects behind at Tanba's estate when she first came here to face Xandred, and had never bothered going back to collect them. Or maybe, given the austere practicality of her upbringing, she just didn't have any personal effects to bring. Both possibilities make Serena sad.

Serena's effort to turn Lauren's room into something that doesn't bear such a resemblance to an extended-stay hotel begins with that one photograph. She happens to take note of it one day, wedged carefully in the corner of the mirror frame. She pauses and studies it. 

It’s a picture of Lauren with her family. There’s no date on it, but judging by how old she and Jayden look, it’s probably one of the last pictures of them all together before everything went wrong. They’re sitting on the back steps of the house, and the place looks exactly the same now as it did all those years ago. Jayden is sitting perched on his father's lap. Lauren is sitting between Ji and her father, with Ji's hand resting on her shoulder. She had been an adorable child; cornsilk-blonde hair tied into slightly uneven pigtails and a big, bright smile that was missing one of its front teeth. 

This should really be in a frame, Serena thinks, as she carefully runs a finger across the photo's worn and fragile edge. So the next time she's out shopping, she buys one. She frames the photo and leaves it sitting on top of Lauren's dresser as a surprise, but if Lauren notices the slight change in the photo's position, she says nothing. 

Not long after that, Emily drags Serena along to the local craft fair, and spots a painting in one of the booths. The sunset is painted in vivid red tones that remind her of Lauren, and the frame happens to coordinate perfectly with the one she just bought for Lauren's photo. She buys it and hangs it up in the glaring blank space on Lauren's wall next time she goes to visit. There’s a vase that follows, left on the nightstand next to Lauren's bed, and Serena picks fresh flowers from the garden to put in it every time she comes over. 

Finally Lauren comes to her with an inquisitive frown and asks, "Did you hang curtains in my room?"

“Yes?” Serena admits, somehow feeling like she’s been caught.

But Lauren doesn’t seem angry or upset. Just perplexed. “Why?”

“I guess I just wanted your room to feel more like a home. You kind of...didn’t have anything in there. It wasn’t decorated. And I like decorating,” Serena explains. She’s starting to fidget uncomfortably as Lauren stays quiet, and adds, “Do you not like it?”

“No, I like it. It looks good,” Lauren reassures her. “I just didn’t understand why you were doing it. What do curtains have to do with a place being home?”

"Things like that just make a place feel more personal, you know? Like it belongs to you."

Lauren thinks about that for awhile, with that serious expression she always gets when she's just learned something she didn't know. 

"I never saw a reason to bother with things like that before," she says, finally. "A room is just a room. But a home...isn't that just wherever your family is? Jayden and Ji...and you. My home is with you three, not any particular place."

"Me?" Serena echoes. She's a bit surprised. She knows she and Lauren have been getting more serious, but to hear herself lumped in with Lauren's small and fiercely -guarded family? That's kind of a big deal.

Lauren nods, her expression turning shy and uncertain. "I feel more at home when you're around."

Serena smiles, and draws her in for a kiss.

***

Lauren still doesn't own very many possessions, and yet Serena keeps finding them in her apartment. Little things; a jacket left on the coat hook, a book left on the bedside table, a pack of hair ties on the bathroom sink. Lauren is usually so meticulous and careful that it can’t be a coincidence, and every time Serena runs across something that was ‘missed’ when Lauren departed from her most recent visit, she wonders what it’s all about.

When a tell-tale red tee shirt appears in Serena’s laundry hamper - mercifully noticed before it can go through the wash and leave any of Serena’s lighter clothes tinted pink - she decides it’s time to bring it up with Lauren. But Lauren beats her to the punch.

“I think we should move in together,” she blurts out over dinner, and at first Serena is too surprised by it to reply.

Lauren hesitates after that, her posture sagging a bit, mistaking Serena’s silence for disapproval. When she continues, she sounds much less certain.

“I had this whole list of reasons why it makes sense...why I think it’s the right thing for us. But the truth is, it's just because I don't want to be away from you anymore. I want my home to be where you are. Which I know is kind of a selfish reason, but -"

"I think it's a very good reason," Serena interrupts. "And I also think you're right. You should move in with me."

Now it's Lauren's turn to look surprised. "You do?"

"Honestly, Lauren, did you think I would say no?"

"No," Lauren admits. "But it’s still your place. I don't want to be an imposition."

"You're not an imposition, you're my girlfriend," Serena admonishes. "Nothing would make me happier than having you here all the time. And besides, you practically live here already."

"It kind of feels like I do," Lauren agrees. 

"There’s just one thing we need to do in order to make it official, then."

"What?"

Serena smiles, bright and excited. "We have to redecorate."

"...Why?"

"Just like your room back at the Shiba House, remember? If we decorate it together, then it'll feel like our home and not just mine."

"My home is wherever you are," Lauren reminds her. But she goes along with it, nonetheless.

A few boxes and a few more shopping trips later, the apartment is transformed. Serena picks out the curtains and Lauren hangs them up. Lauren's family photo sits on the bookshelf in the living room, flanked by a photo of Serena's family and a photo of the Samurai Rangers, all in matching frames. The rug is yellow and the throw pillows are red, and nothing matches until Lauren suggests hanging up the sunset painting, its warm hues tying their colors together. They replace Serena's twin bed with one that's actually big enough for both of them. 

Maybe, Lauren thinks, Serena had a point with this decorating stuff all along. Because it's not Serena's anymore, and it’s not Lauren's. It’s the home they've built together. 

It’s perfect.


End file.
